The Looking Ceremony at Seville European Film Festival

The Looking Ceremony at Seville European Film Festival competition

The new film by Fany de la Chica follows Isa, a real gypsy living in Andalusia ( Spain), as she experiences a tradition in which older women in her family confirm her virginity.

Fany de la Chica hails from a small city surrounded by olive fields, Jaen, in Andalusia (south of Spain) but she's based in New York. Her mum and aunts inherited the role of being strong, independent women from her grandmother; and this, in turn, has had a similar effect on me. She was able to study due to scholarships. She studied cinematography at the School of Cinema Studies of Catalonia (Barcelona), an MA in Documentary at the Royal Holloway University of London and the MFA in Directing/Screenwriting at Columbia University of New York.

Her work has been published in the magazine CINEWOMEN, highlighting her as an important upcoming female film director. She was selected for Berlinale Talent Campus 2015 and started her career making documentaries.

Her first short documentary, Round Trip was funded by the Spanish Culture Ministry, preselected for the Goya Academy Awards -Spain- and broadcast on the public Spanish television.

One day in Smara was made in the Sahara desert, was screened in forty international festivals, winning six awards ( including Special Jury Mention at London International Documentary Festival) and was also broadcast on Community Channel (UK). Her film The Visit made in Cambodia and funded by One World Media was screened in more than thirty international festivals, won four awards (Best documentary - International Human Rights Film Festival -Colombia-, Best short documentary at Houston International Film Festival ...) and broadcast on the public television in Denmark DR2.

Her latest work, The Looking Ceremony (aka El Miramiento) received the "New View" award by Glamour magazine and Girl Gaze. it was featured at the Hollywood Reporter magazine. In a personal capacity, she received the award “The Andalusian of the Future” in the culture category.